{"id":54323,"date":"2020-07-22T10:46:23","date_gmt":"2020-07-22T15:46:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=54323"},"modified":"2020-07-22T10:46:28","modified_gmt":"2020-07-22T15:46:28","slug":"people-want-a-greener-happier-world-now-but-our-politicians-have-other-ideas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=54323","title":{"rendered":"People want a greener, happier world now. But our politicians have other ideas"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/commentisfree\/2020\/jul\/21\/greener-happier-world-politicians-boris-johnson-consumerism-planet\">People want a greener, happier world now. But our politicians have other ideas<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Boris Johnson\u2019s \u2018return to normality\u2019 will only mean more consumerism at the expense of the planet \u2013 we must resist it<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/f8a9beefe9cb2b8f6147abb43e6277415272288a\/0_43_1920_1152\/master\/1920.jpg?width=445&amp;quality=85&amp;auto=format&amp;fit=max&amp;s=ec44f46643a8d0230a3c768762cd6317\" alt=\"A helicopter battles a wildfire in Khanty-Mansi, Siberia, July 2020.\"\/><figcaption>A helicopter battles a wildfire in Khanty-Mansi, Siberia, July 2020.\u00a0Photograph: Denis Bushkovsky\/TASS<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Out there somewhere, marked on no map but tantalisingly near, is a promised land called Normal, to which one day we can return. This is the magical geography we are taught by politicians, such as Boris Johnson with his \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2020\/jul\/17\/boris-johnson-unveils-next-steps-in-englands-coronavirus-response\">significant return to normality<\/a>\u201d. It is the story we tell ourselves, even if we contradict it with the very next thought.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There are practical reasons to believe that Normal is a fairyland to which we can never return. The virus has not gone away, and is likely to&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2020\/jul\/14\/action-to-stop-winter-covid-19-second-wave-in-uk-must-start-now\">keep recurring in waves<\/a>. But let\u2019s focus on another question: if such a land existed, would we want to live there?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The polls consistently suggest we would not. A\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2020\/jul\/12\/only-12-want-a-return-to-the-old-normal-britain-after-covid-19\">survey<\/a>\u00a0by BritainThinks a fortnight ago found that only 12% of people want life to be \u201cexactly as it was before\u201d. A poll at the end of June, commissioned by the nursery provider Bright Horizons, suggested that just\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2020\/jun\/28\/only-13-of-uk-working-parents-want-to-go-back-to-the-old-normal\">13%<\/a>\u00a0of people want to return to working as they did before the lockdown. A YouGov study in the same week revealed that only\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2020\/jun\/28\/just-6-of-uk-public-want-a-return-to-pre-pandemic-economy\">6%<\/a>\u00a0of us want the same type of economy as we had before the pandemic. Another survey by the same pollsters in April showed only\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/news.sky.com\/story\/coronavirus-only-9-of-britons-want-life-to-return-to-normal-once-lockdown-is-over-11974459\">9%<\/a>\u00a0of respondents wanted a return to \u201cnormal\u201d. It\u2019s rare to see such strong and consistent results on any major issue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u2026click on the above link to read the rest of the article\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>People want a greener, happier world now. But our politicians have other ideas Boris Johnson\u2019s \u2018return to normality\u2019 will only mean more consumerism at the expense of the planet \u2013 we must resist it Out there somewhere, marked on no map but tantalisingly near, is a promised land called Normal, to which one day we [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[140,6112,18462,6917,855],"class_list":["post-54323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-environment","tag-climate","tag-george-monbiot","tag-normal","tag-the-guardian","tag-viral-pandemic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=54323"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54323\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54324,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54323\/revisions\/54324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=54323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=54323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=54323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}